Saboteur by Ha Jin Analysis Essay Example

The short story Saboteur by Ha Jin is a story about what happens when government fails to uphold its end of the social contract. Mr. Chiu is a professor of communist ideology and is recovering from hepatitis. Mr. Chiu becomes a victim of the communist party’s abuse of power. Jin uses irony to satirize communist China’s abuse of power and how this can result in the sabotaged becoming the saboteur.

The first use of irony is first seen at the beginning of the story when Mr. Chiu and his wife are eating lunch in Muji city. Suddenly Mr. Chiu and his wife’s feet are covered in tea. Mr. Chiu turns to the police officers sitting next to him and asks them why they have done this. “‘You're lying. You wet your shoes yourself.’ ‘Comrade policeman, your duty is to keep order, but you purposely tortured us common citizens. Why violate the law you are supposed to enforce?’” (Jin 410). The use of the word comrade is important to note as Mr. Chiu sees the policeman as his equal. Mr. Chiu is confused because the police officer is supposed to be upholding the law and he is purposely breaking the law and acting like he did not throw tea on Mr. Chiu’s feet. Mr. Chiu is then arrested by the policeman and as Mr. Chiu is taken away, he grumbles to the policeman. “The young fellow added, "You're a saboteur, you know? You're disrupting public order."”. This is where we see the first use of irony as the police officer calls Mr. Chiu a saboteur. Although it is extremely clear to the reader that Mr. Chiu is sabotaged and not the saboteur this helps the reader understand how the communist party abusing their power contributes to the development of Mr. Chiu becoming an actual saboteur.

Once Mr. Chiu is at the jail he is put into a cell with a single window. Mr. Chiu then lays down on the small bed in the cell. “He was too exhausted to worry about what they would do to him, so he lay down on the narrow bed, with his eyes shut. He wasn't afraid. The Cultural Revolution was over already, and recently the Party had been propagating the idea that all citizens were equal before the law” (Jin 411). Here we see that although everyone is equal according to the government the police officers do not act as if this is the case. This angers Mr. Chiu because we come to find out he is a communist party member and truly believes everyone should be equal under a communist system. Mr. Chiu is then taken to the interrogation bureau part of the jail to be questioned. The chief starts to talk to Mr. Chiu. “"Your crime is sabotage, although it hasn't induced serious consequences yet. Because you are a Party member, you should be punished more. You have failed to be a model for the masses and you-" "Excuse me, sir," Mr. Chiu cut him off. "What?" "I didn't do anything. Your men are the saboteurs of our social order” (Jin 412). The confession is ironic because Mr. Chiu did not commit a crime. The other ironic part of this confession is that under communist ideology everyone should be equal under the law when this is not the case. Jin uses this second instance of irony to also show how the communist party’s abuse of power is contributing to Mr. Chiu becoming an actual saboteur.

The third use of irony is during the second interrogation of Mr. Chiu and subsequent release. Fenjin, who is from Harbin University, is coming to get Mr. Chiu out of jail. Fenjin was then wrongfully arrested and handcuffed to a tree and beaten in the backyard. Mr. Chiu can see this from his cell window and is even angrier now. Mr. Chiu is then taken to the interrogation room once more. Mr. Chiu then tells the integrators that it is illegal to treat Fenjin the way they did and asks if they are afraid of appearing in the newspaper. The integrators explain if he does not comply his friend will stay outside in the backyard suffering in the sun. The integrators then tell Mr. Chiu that they went to the trouble of writing up his confession for him. “‘I have realized the reactionary nature of my crime. From now on, I shall continue to educate myself with all my effort and shall never commit this kind of crime again.’ ‘A voice started screaming in Mr. Chiu's head, ‘Lie, lie!’ But he shook his head and forced the voice away’” (Jin 417). The ironic part about the confession is the fact that it requires Mr. Chiu to continue to “educate” himself when in fact he is a professor of dialectical materialism which is the philosophy of the communist party he belongs to. Mr. Chiu then signs the confession and is subsequently released with Fenjin. At this point, Mr. Chiu’s hepatitis has flared up again, so he decides to go to restaurants around the police station to infect the police officers. “Fenjin was baffled by his teacher, who looked ferocious and muttered to himself mysteriously, and whose jaundiced face was covered with dark puckers. For the first time, Fenjin thought of Mr. Chiu as an ugly man” (Jin 419). Fenjin describing Mr. Chiu as ugly indicates that Mr. Chiu has finally become a saboteur. This is ironic because Mr. Chiu has become something he does not believe in. 

Saboteur is essentially about what happens when the social contract is not upheld by and the consequences of this. Jin’s use of irony with the treatment of Mr. Chiu and his transformation into a saboteur the story helps the reader understand the consequences of abuse of power government.